Looks like Cricinfo staff reporters lost control on use of words in their reports. I guess they are emotionally so much biased that when the outcome of the game does not match their desire, they lose their responsibility as a journalist to apply unbiased objective judgment in explaining the match situation. That’s how they lose decency of word use in their reports. Here are some examples:

In India-Pakistan 1st Test Match Bulletin:

Four years on from the Ides of March that tormented Steve Waugh in Kolkata, India were at the receiving end of a rearguard action that is certain to go down in the annals

India’s waste of time and run-scoring opportunities had come back to deservedly kick them in the teeth

And as Chinaman quoted in another thread yesterday about Cricinfo article on ZIM-SA 2nd Test:

"So it is strangely heartening to learn that the Zimbabweans are capable of kicking poor defenceless animals when they are down. If only the South Africans could have been similarly cruel today. Sometimes, the only right thing is to put such creatures out of their misery."

" that is certain to go down in the annals" - now what is wrong with this?

Annals mean a record or a chronological history. Very appropos in this context.

"Kicked them in the teeth" - is an oft used metaphor. It was incorrectly used in in this context; perhaps stemming from the author's lack of familiarity with English idioms. A better one to try would have been "shooting themselves in the feet".

Often innocuous similes and metaphors that are correct and appropriate in one languages sound awkward and sometimes even offensive in another language unless one is very familiar with the use in context. This goes in both directions. In Bangla, we have some very colorful expressions that, when translated into English word for word, sound very strange.